KRISTIN NORDERVAL’S career has been twofold: as a soloist working closely with composers such as Pauline Oliveros, Philip Glass, Annea Lockwood and Anne Le Baron, and as a composer and improviser working with technology. Kristin is inspired by hybridity, interactivity, and the idea that everything one does is site-specific. She blends acoustic and electronic sound, and is fascinated with home-made instruments, machines, and ambient sound. Between 2019 and 2023 Kristin was a PhD Research Fellow at the Oslo National Academy of Opera in Norway, where she developed her Expanded Vocal Improvising Instrument (EVII) for gestural vocal processing using wireless MIDI rings. Kristin has used the EVII in her latest opera, Crane Reflects on a Favor, and in collaborations with Limpe Fuchs, Peter van Bergen, Jill Sigman, and Miguel Frasconi. In tonight´s concert Kristin will perform with the EVII to explore themes of presence, place, and the distortion of time.

ANNE HEGE will perform works for her instrument, the Tape Machine, interwoven with excerpts from her latest project, The Glance: A Laptopera, her second opera for laptop orchestra and live instruments, and works for Tether controller Becoming Within and Like Roots. The Tape Machine, first constructed in 2009, is a portable instrument created with three hacked cassette players––one recording tape head and two playback points running a handmade tape loop. In simple terms, it is an analog, live-looping instrument where the listener, by sound alone, can identify the transparent process and technology. There is no hidden processing, just the magic of a single blank tape loop. Through her instrument design, Hege explores the collaboration possible through instrument design, improvisation, and systems that invite risk and unknowns.

The WEST OAKLAND SOUND SERIES continues its new improv project on the second set grouping together talented local musicians from different circles within the wider contemporary music community. LORIN BENEDICT (voice), BRETT CARSON (piano), JEFF HOBBS (violin), and RICHARD WORN (bass) join series curator MATT INGALLS (clarinet) in a set of free improvisations. This performance is part of what we hope will be a continuous series of exciting collaborations, showcasing the diverse and vibrant Bay Area contemporary music scene.